Adventure Gamers - Forums

Hi Guys,
I grew up -until I was about fifteen- in the Chicago area. When I was nine my mom had married my step father and he and I didn’t have much in common - I was a trouble making hyper creative kid, he was a no nonsense business exec and a neat freak- until I started watching football with him. I played a little playground sports but wasn’t into pro sports at all. But then he took me to my first Super Bowl party with a bunch of Chicago Bears fans. It was surprsingly fun! We were strangers,but all bonded and became like a little community while rooting for the same team. So rooting for the Chicago Bears together was a great way to bond with my stepfather, and made me feel like a true Chicagoan. And the nickname of Chicago Bears fans is the Grabowskis. Demigod coach Mike Ditka came up with that name probably due to the fact that Grabowski is a common working class name in Chicago, where a lot of Polish immigrants settled. It seems like a great name for a big linebacker-sized tough guy- and Chicago is known as the ‘city of big shoulders,’ and Duke has some pretty big shoulders. A few people thought it was a riff on the word ‘grab,’ but not all. It is just a cool name for a group I kind of belong to. Its even in the Urban Dictionary.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Grabowski

Here is a perfect imitation of a Grabowski done by the TV show Saturday Night Live.

https://screen.yahoo.com/snl-iconic-skits/bill-swerskis-super-fans-da-000000191.html

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What a great story and a great looking game. I wish you the best on this.

billt - 09 August 2014 01:00 PM

Hi Guys,
I grew up -until I was about fifteen- in the Chicago area. When I was nine my mom had married my step father and he and I didn’t have much in common - I was a trouble making hyper creative kid, he was a no nonsense business exec and a neat freak- until I started watching football with him. I played a little playground sports but wasn’t into pro sports at all. But then he took me to my first Super Bowl party with a bunch of Chicago Bears fans. It was surprsingly fun! We were strangers,but all bonded and became like a little community while rooting for the same team. So rooting for the Chicago Bears together was a great way to bond with my stepfather, and made me feel like a true Chicagoan. And the nickname of Chicago Bears fans is the Grabowskis. Demigod coach Mike Ditka came up with that name probably due to the fact that Grabowski is a common working class name in Chicago, where a lot of Polish immigrants settled. It seems like a great name for a big linebacker-sized tough guy- and Chicago is known as the ‘city of big shoulders,’ and Duke has some pretty big shoulders. A few people thought it was a riff on the word ‘grab,’ but not all. It is just a cool name for a group I kind of belong to. Its even in the Urban Dictionary.

I was wondering about the name.  I loved those Superfans skits on Saturday Night Live.  Are you planning on having Duke have the accent?  It could be fun, as it would be an interesting contrast to his huge size.

diego - 10 August 2014 05:27 AM

Bill Tiller, pirates… always a treat, but if you ask me I’d like to finish A Vampyre Story first.

This game is for them to get experience creating adventure games on the unity engine. A such it is very possible that this could lead to the development of the next vampire story.

I would like to work on AVS2 as well but it a complicated situation and we legally cant work on AVS2 without consent from Crimson Cow. All I can say is the good folks at Crimson Cow and I do talk on a regular basis.We have not forgotten about AVS2 at all, but that is all I can say about it at this point. Any question about AVS2 should be directed to Crimson Cow. I am sure they would be glad to hear from you.

billt - 11 August 2014 01:47 PM

I would like to work on AVS2 as well but it a complicated situation and we legally cant work on AVS2 without consent from Crimson Cow. All I can say is the good folks at Crimson Cow and I do talk on a regular basis.We have not forgotten about AVS2 at all, but that is all I can say about it at this point. Any question about AVS2 should be directed to Crimson Cow. I am sure they would be glad to hear from you.

It is a real shame when you get to experience a world and story brought through the art of adventure games and not have the full story told. When you invest emotionally in characters and want closure by seeing there journey end, it can be a terrible situation for people who are pationate about adventure games. So I have emailed crimson cow imploring them to finish the story.

Further upon this subject, it is also very upsetting to see the decline of the adventure game genera. This is why kickstarters like these are so important. It is the community, the fans and those that truly appreciate adventure games duty to keep adventure games alive and it is websites like adventure gamers and developers like Bill Tiller, Gene mossy and the unspoken heroes like Jeremiah Grant that keep it going. I truly appreciate the experience these developers bring, the enjoyment, laughter and inspiration we got just from curse of monkey island is testament enough that we need to give back. We need to support the adventure game developers who work hard to try and give us this magical experience despite the decline of those that purchase there product. This is more then a adventure game. It is a statement to say we want these games. If we can not contribute financially, then we need to put in the effort to spread news about these projects and to encourage further projects like these, so there will not be a day when we can not enjoy work such as Bill Tillers, gene mocsy and Jeremiah Grant.

For now I would just like to say, thank you Bill for the magic and please do not stop bringing us these great experiences through your art.

To be honest I wasn’t too thrilled when I first heard that Bill Tiller was involved in yet another Kickstarter campaign, as much as I love his art.
But It seems like I didn’t get enough of pirate themed adventure games quite yet, because this looks like a lot of fun and I want to play it!
The prison is a bit too much, though. I guess it was intended as an homage, but to me it’s one step too far, despite BT’s background.

Hi Dean & Kate,

Thanks for the kind words. The creative businesses are complicated. Sort of like doing a balancing act on board a ship. When a storm comes up you cant do your act. This is what slows down production. But eventually lulls happen in the storm. SO we hope we are in one of those lulls and are going to do our best to take advantage of it and get this game done, and hopefully other in the near future as well.
Thanks for helping spread the news about our game and adventure games in general. We will do our best doing that, as well as our best at making a good game. The more good graphic adventures get made the better the chance they will become more popular again. So we have to hold up our end of the bargain too.

Bill

Shnubble - 12 August 2014 09:39 AM

To be honest I wasn’t too thrilled when I first heard that Bill Tiller was involved in yet another Kickstarter campaign, as much as I love his art.
But It seems like I didn’t get enough of pirate themed adventure games quite yet, because this looks like a lot of fun and I want to play it!
The prison is a bit too much, though. I guess it was intended as an homage, but to me it’s one step too far, despite BT’s background.

Is there something I have done to make you displeased with my games? Maybe I will be able to address those issues in the next game. I am open to fair and honest feedback for sure.

And why did you think my homage to MI2 ‘went to far?’ Are you concerned I don’t have a strong enough imagination to come up with my own jail cell? or that I violated Disney IP?
To be clear I did do it as an Easter Egg to see if anyone would notice, even going so far as to put the the Manila and Gorilla envelopes on the desk. I thought MI2 fans would like seeing my take on the that jail. It was for nostalgia too.

Was that wrong of me to do? If so would you please explain why?

I was not planning on adding anymore locations as Easter eggs in the game, though I will add other types of Easter eggs for fun. I am always thrilled when people find them. Though sometimes they find some that aren’t there, that is fun too. For example, people thought I put Purple Tentacle in A Vampyre Story, when really it was just a similar shape, not intended.

-Bill

TimovieMan - 09 August 2014 06:06 AM

You had me at “Bill Tiller”.

Also, I didn’t see it under “inspirations”, but were you inspired by ‘Dude’ Lebowski when picking the main character’s name?

Duke was inspired by John Wayne. I thought it sounded like a good tough guy moniker. Also I have heard royal titles used in pirate and Caribbean settings. We had Queen Zimbi in Ghost Pirates and in CMI I think we had King Andre. I thought Duke would be a good title to use along that vein.  I also liked the the one syllable sound of it, kind of reminded me of the Hulk too.

-Bill